Emily Rodda - Deltora Quest #1 - The Forests of Silence

So, it was settled. Jarred took shears and cut off the long plaits of hair that marked him so plainly as coming from the palace. And after that, every day, he worked in the forge.

He already knew how to hammer hot iron and steel to make fine swords and shields. Now he had to learn to make simpler things, like horseshoes, axes, and blades for ploughs. But this he did quickly, and as his muscles hardened and his soft hands grew tough he took over more and more of the blacksmith’s work.

The forge was busy, but still Crian and Anna were poor. Jarred soon discovered that this was because most of the people in Del were even poorer, and could pay little for the work the blacksmith did for them. Some, indeed, could give nothing. And these Crian would help all the same, saying, “Pay me when you can.”

By the second day, Jarred had realized with a sinking heart that everything he and Endon had been taught about life outside the palace had been a lie. The city was a place of hunger, illness, and struggle. Beyond its walls, strange, terrible beasts and bands of robbers prowled. For many years no news had come from the towns and villages scattered through the countryside.

Many people were weak with hunger. Yet it was said that in the dead of night heavily guarded carts piled high with food and drink trundled into the city and up to the palace gates. No one knew where the carts came from.

“Somewhere far away, in any case,” Crian muttered, as they sat by the fire on the second night. “Such luxuries could not be found here.”

“It is said that Deltora was once a land of peace and plenty,” Anna added. “But that was a long time ago.”

“The new king knows nothing of this!” Jarred cried. “Neither did the old king. You should have told him —”

“ Told him?” Crian growled angrily. “We told him time and again!” He swung around in his chair and pulled an old tin box from the shelf. He thrust the box at Jarred. “Open it!” he ordered.

Jarred lifted the lid of the box. Inside were many small rolls of parchment edged with gold. Confused, he picked out one of the rolls and straightened it.

Frowning, Jarred thrust the parchment back into the box and picked out another. It was exactly the same. And so was the next he looked at, and the next. The only difference in the fourth was that it spoke of “The Queen” instead of “The King” and was signed “Lilia.” Queen Lilia had been Alton’s mother, Jarred remembered.

He scrabbled through the parchments. There were hundreds of them, all stamped with the royal seal. Some were much older than others, signed with royal names he remembered from his history lessons.

“They are all the same,” Crian said, watching him reading one after the other. “The only difference between them is the name at the bottom. For centuries messages have been sent to the palace, begging for help. And these accursed parchments are all the people have ever received in return. Nothing has ever been done. Nothing!”

Jarred’s throat tightened with pain and anger. “King Alton, at least, never received your messages, Crian,” he said, as calmly as he could. “I think they were kept from him by his chief advisor. A man called Prandine.”

“The king signed these replies and fixed to them his royal seal,” Crian pointed out coldly, flicking his finger at the box. “As did his mother and grandfather before him.”

“It is the Rule — the custom — that the chief advisor prepares all replies for the king to sign,” exclaimed Jarred. “The old king signed and sealed whatever Prandine put in front of him.”

“Then he was a fool and a weakling!” Crian snapped back. “As no doubt his son is also! Endon will be as useless to us as his father.” He shook his head. “I fear for Deltora,” he muttered. “We are now so weak that should invasion come from the Shadowlands we could do nothing to protect ourselves.”

“The Shadow Lord will not invade, Grandfather,” Anna soothed. “Not while the Belt of Deltora protects us. And our king guards the Belt. That, at least, he does for us.”

Jarred felt a chill of fear. But he could not bring himself to tell Anna that she was wrong. If she found out that the king did not wear the Belt but let it be shut away, under the care of others, she would lose the last of her hope.

Oh, Endon, he thought, as he went to bed that night. I cannot reach you unless you wish it. You are too well guarded. But you can reach me. Go to the hollow tree. Read my note. Send the signal.

From that time on, before he started work each morning, Jarred looked up at the tree rising against the misty cloud on the hill. He would look carefully, searching for the glint of the king’s golden arrow at the top. The signal that Endon needed him.

But it was a long, long time before the signal came. And by then it was too late.

Years passed and life went on. Jarred and Anna married. Then old Crian died and Jarred took his place as blacksmith.

Sometimes Jarred almost forgot that he had ever had another life. It was as if his time at the palace had been a dream. But still, every dawn, he looked up to the tree on the hill. And still he often read the small book he had found in the palace library. Then he feared for what the future might hold. He feared for his beloved Anna and the child they were expecting. He feared for himself, for Endon, and for the whole of Deltora.

One night, exactly seven years after the night Endon was crowned, Jarred tossed restlessly in his bed.

“It is nearly daybreak and you have not slept, Jarred,” Anna said gently, at last. “What is troubling you?”

“I do not know, dear heart,” Jarred murmured. “But I cannot rest.”

“Perhaps the room is too warm,” she said, climbing out of bed. “I will open the window a little more.”

She had pulled the curtains aside and was reaching for the window fastening when suddenly she screamed and jumped back.

Jarred leapt up and ran to her.

“There!” Anna exclaimed, pointing, as he put his arm around her. “Oh, Jarred, what are they?”

Jarred stared through the window and caught his breath. In the sky above the palace on the hill, monstrous shapes were wheeling and circling.

It was still too dark to see them clearly. But there was no doubt that they were huge birds. There were seven. Their necks were long. Their great, hooked beaks were cruel. Their mighty wings flapped clumsily but strongly, beating at the air. As Jarred watched, they swooped, rose again, and then separated, flying off swiftly in different directions.

A name came to him. A name from the school room of his past.

“Ak-Baba,” he hissed. His arm tightened around Anna’s shoulders.

She turned to him, her eyes wide and frightened.

“Ak-Baba,” he repeated slowly, still staring at the palace. “Great birds that eat dead flesh and live for a thousand years. Seven of them serve the Shadow Lord.”

“Why are they here?” Anna whispered.

“I do not know. But I fear —” Jarred broke off abruptly and leaned forward. He had seen something glinting brightly in the first feeble rays of the sun.

For a moment he stood motionless. Then he turned to Anna, his face grim and pale.

“Endon’s arrow is in the tree,” he said. “The call has come.”

In moments Jarred had dressed and run from the house behind the forge. He hurried up the hill to the palace, his mind racing.